There's an interesting pattern I've noticed with the major antagonists in the KH series, and I've thought of an intriguing way it could be subverted in the future.
The one thing that unites all the major villains of the series (besides the obligatory attachment to darkness, of course) seems to be the tendency to use other people. This is a pretty typical villain thing to do, so it's not terribly noteworthy on its own, except that in this series it provides a good contrast to the themes of friendship and self-sacrifice that are inherent in Sora's character and in the personality traits of the other protagonists.
Maleficent used her allies and Riku and Pete to attain her ends repeatedly throughout the series, often treating them as disposably as possible.
Ansem SoD used children as test subjects to sate his curiosity.
Xemnas used his fellow Organization members as tools to gather hearts for him.
Xehanort himself used all the various incarnations of himself as fodder to forge the X-blade.
And now we have the Master of Masters using his own apprentices and all the children of Daybreak Town as collateral in his own single-minded quest to destroy Darkness.
In each of these cases, the villain seeks to achieve their own goals either directly or indirectly through using the people around them as pawns rather then as fellow partners, even (as in Xehanort's case) when those partners were literally extensions of himself.
Again, there's nothing really new here in terms of villainous behavior in children's media. We've seen this trope a bunch of times before, even though it bears particular relevance in this series.
But I started wondering, what would it be like if in the future we got a villain who flipped that script a little?
What about a villain who actually did have a network of friends and allies that they genuinely cared about? I wonder, would that make them more formidable of an adversary to Sora and his friends? What would happen when Sora's philosophy of friends being power gets turned against him, and he had to deal with a villain who gained their strength from the camaraderie and mutual loyalty of those around them? I could see a dynamic like that being used to throw Sora and his allies for a loop, maybe even resulting in some significant defeats. Perhaps their bonds could be stronger than our heroes'. It's a small change in the formula, but I think that would make for an interesting and different type of villain to fight against.
The one thing that unites all the major villains of the series (besides the obligatory attachment to darkness, of course) seems to be the tendency to use other people. This is a pretty typical villain thing to do, so it's not terribly noteworthy on its own, except that in this series it provides a good contrast to the themes of friendship and self-sacrifice that are inherent in Sora's character and in the personality traits of the other protagonists.
Maleficent used her allies and Riku and Pete to attain her ends repeatedly throughout the series, often treating them as disposably as possible.
Ansem SoD used children as test subjects to sate his curiosity.
Xemnas used his fellow Organization members as tools to gather hearts for him.
Xehanort himself used all the various incarnations of himself as fodder to forge the X-blade.
And now we have the Master of Masters using his own apprentices and all the children of Daybreak Town as collateral in his own single-minded quest to destroy Darkness.
In each of these cases, the villain seeks to achieve their own goals either directly or indirectly through using the people around them as pawns rather then as fellow partners, even (as in Xehanort's case) when those partners were literally extensions of himself.
Again, there's nothing really new here in terms of villainous behavior in children's media. We've seen this trope a bunch of times before, even though it bears particular relevance in this series.
But I started wondering, what would it be like if in the future we got a villain who flipped that script a little?
What about a villain who actually did have a network of friends and allies that they genuinely cared about? I wonder, would that make them more formidable of an adversary to Sora and his friends? What would happen when Sora's philosophy of friends being power gets turned against him, and he had to deal with a villain who gained their strength from the camaraderie and mutual loyalty of those around them? I could see a dynamic like that being used to throw Sora and his allies for a loop, maybe even resulting in some significant defeats. Perhaps their bonds could be stronger than our heroes'. It's a small change in the formula, but I think that would make for an interesting and different type of villain to fight against.
